


paint a pretty picture

by pandoracorn



Series: DR Birthdays 2018 [10]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Another Episode
Genre: Canon-Compliant, Gen, Hurt and comfort, birthday fic, character study-ish?, set between DRAE and DR3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 15:38:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13860792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pandoracorn/pseuds/pandoracorn
Summary: he was robbed of his voice, and could no longer scream--Jataro Kemuri, a Priest class, a painter barely out of grade school and thrown into circumstances he had control of, maybe, at one time. But now that all was said and done, he wished he could change the picture that he’d painted.





	paint a pretty picture

**Author's Note:**

> this is so late i'm so sorry sweetie you deserve so much better than me i love y
> 
> i hope this is ok!! I love Jataro a lot and I'm so so so so so so _so_ sorry this is so late. It won't be this late ever again!! that being said, though, there's a chance i won't finish touko's fic in time, it might just clock over to 4/3, but i promise it's gettin done!! no more depression, we get things done in time like Men!!

Artist’s block was hell.

 

It was bad language of him to say so, but it was the truth. He found his brush hovering over the canvas when most of the time it could do what it wanted, like his hand was sentient and separate from himself. When the tip of the brush eventually did begin to paint, it meant nothing, it was just meaningless strokes for the sake of it. It wasn’t art, either the art he came to know or the art that the world at large accepted before they could only accept despair. He stared at the stroke that just looked like a smear, groaned, and tossed the canvas aside with the others he had done the same to, the pile growing larger since the start of the week (possibly? Time was hard to keep track of in this day and age. That’s what Big Sis had said, he reasoned to himself, so she must be right.)

 

Jataro kept an art stock under his bed, in the room he shared with Masaru and Nagisa. The former was there, of course, as he almost always was, playing on the handheld that Big Sis had gotten him to keep him out of trouble, sat on his bed with his tongue stuck out in concentration, his legs crossed, sitting reasonably still, for once. Nagisa, however, was nowhere to be seen, and was probably helping out the negotiations with the big scary men in the black suits, about what to do with the kids who destroyed the city.

“Yo, Jataro,” Masaru didn’t look up from his device, but had obviously heard the shuffling through the door. “What’re you doin’?”

“Uh… getting my stuff… why…?” 

Masaru shrugged, again, not looking up. “Cool. Be quick, I’m doin’ stuff.”

“Oh… OK.” Doing as he was told, Jataro bent down under his bed and pulled out the wide, shallow tray of his art supplies, grabbing another canvas and pushing the tray under again. Standing to his feet, he began to walk out again, before stopping at the doorway, holding the canvas against his chest, his arms crossed over it. “Hey… Masaru…?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I… ask you something…?”

“I mean, sure, I guess.”

He paused, blinking for a moment. “Well, do you think… they’re gonna kill us?”

Masaru didn’t say anything for a moment, though his tongue slowly retracted back into his mouth, as he lost concentration on the game he was playing and paused it, before putting it down on his lap. The frown on his face was clear to see, with the furrowing of his brow signalling that it had never even crossed his mind before… or maybe, perhaps, he was trying hard not to think of it too much. “...I don’t know. But don’t worry. Nagisa’ll sort it all out. He’s the smart cookie, even if  _ I’m  _ the leader.”

Jataro watched as Masaru stuck his tongue out and gave a quick thumbs up, trying to remain carefree and untroubled by their situation, as he always did. But deep down, it was clear both of the boys were just as worried as one another for their fates in the future. 

 

No other words were exchanged between then before Jataro left, heading back for his painting spot - in a room of the hotel with windows for three walls, overlooking Towa City, or what little was left of it, to try and at least give him an ounce of inspiration, and it had worked, since Big Sis Komaru had let them stay in the hotel with her and the other lady. But now, the view provoked no artistic inspiration from him, but it brought him such comfort that he didn’t want to move. And so, he placed the canvas down one the easel and sat down at it again, rolling up his sleeves before picking up the paintbrush and holding it lightly in his hand, bouncing his hand up and down to make sure his grip was loose enough, but not too loose to make it so he couldn’t control it, in case he found some string of motivation to draw something meaningful. 

 

5 minutes passed. This was normal.

 

Another 5 minutes, making it 10. Still, nothing.

 

Half an hour from when he had first sat down, with the intention of drawing something. The canvas still remained blank. And it seemed like it wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

 

Jataro leant back slightly from where he sat on the stool, and placed his paintbrush on the easel once more, sighing to himself. When things were going wrong, he found time to paint. After they’d seen thousands of adults die, he could still paint. From the dark, unknown place that the Monokids had taken him to, he traced pictures on the wall with his fingers and found inspiration in the darkness. Now, his life was on the line, as the people he’d heard were called the Future Foundation were considering locking him and his friends away forever, despite their young age, for their crimes, and yet, his paintbrush remained silent, the only medium he could scream through did not open its mouth, and so he was left without a voice to express his distress and grief, for he didn’t know any other way how.

 

He didn’t even hear the girl come in, nor did he feel the tears hit his skin, skin so foreign to him, even now, and flinched little when he felt a blanket against his shoulders.

“...Big Sis…?”

Komaru nodded, and smiled, poking her head around to look at him, taking her hand and gently wiping his eyes. “Hey… I was about to make some hot cocoa. Would you like some?”

“...Did you and Nagisa finish with the meeting thingy…?”

“Yeah… are you scared?”

He wanted to say yes, but his mouth remained shut, leaving her to come to her own conclusions, her smile fading the slightest amount before it bounced back again, as she came around to see him face-to-face, slipping in between the stool and the blank canvas to kneel down, holding his face in her hands and resting their foreheads together.

“...Me too. I promise, I won’t let them take you, OK? What kind of sister would I be if I didn’t put up a fight?” She laughed, almost emptily, before moving her hands to hug him gently, and briefly, knowing how iffy he was about touch… though he was slowly getting better, and god, she could not be any prouder. “It’s all OK. Now, how about that cocoa?”

Jataro stared for a moment, feeling himself tear up again, before nodding. “...OK. Can we make some for the others, too…?”

“Sure thing. Whatever you want, Jataro.”


End file.
